Thornton Heath memories
Here are memories of Thornton Heath and the local area. You can start now: Add your own Memory of Thornton Heath or a Thornton Heath photo.
I Lived And Worked Nearby
We lived as a family in Gonville Road with St Judes Church on the corner of Thornton Road, to the left of this picture. I remember the Pond when it was full of rubbish so this garden was an improvement when it was filled in. My first job was at the National Provincial Bank, and from the window of the staff room (it looks as though that is where this photo was taken from) I remember the cherry trees flowering covered in lovely white and pink blossom. They must have been planted just after this photo, as I started work there in August 1964. It was very noisy being on the corner, and the leaves in autumn used to blow inside. There was an electric pump in the basement of the bank to remove water when the water table got too high, so I wonder if there was a natural spring? The bank at 737 London Road was sold at some stage and became... Read more
My Father
I did not know my father, I only remember him in the early part of my life but I knew he worked for the coal yard in Thornton Heath, he had a large Shire horse and the last I know of him was standing at the horse's head with a rosette on the reins, ribbons on the mane and tail, and there were three children sitting on the cart, I think one of them was me but I have no photo to check this. I am now searching the family tree so if anyone has any photos or pictures that I can have a copy of I would be grateful.
Food Outlets
I can remember the suppliers of food and the taxi rank on the island at the Clock Tower - their pies were particularly nice and the taxi drivers very friendly. At the same place the freshly loaded coal wagons used to park whilst there drivers bought a pie - their horses were enormous - at least to me as a little boy. Thinking about it I think there was also a drinking fountain for us kids etc and a trough for the horses. They were loaded up in the coaling department of Thornton Heath Station Goods department. In my day - as a child - I used to go to the bridge a little way down the line and sit on the wall overlooking the rail-lines and watch the steam trains shunting the wagons. The wall was about six feet high and made of blue bricks - it was scary fun to walk on the top - especially over the bridge. I have checked... Read more
Frogs - Newts & Ice
I used to visit my aunt & uncle who lived in this - as it was known to me - the posh area of Thornton Heath: it was even pronounced differently - where I lived we invariably but a "mate" on the end of everything. Anyway - this was a favourite place for me - for frog and newt hunting - and in the winter - ice skating: I even fell through the ice one year. It was - as I remember a terminus for one of the London Tram routs and there was a tram depot nearby. As a family of children we were sent to the Granada cinema for Saturday morning films and an ice cream - one of those dreadful Walls bricks made from - as we were to understand - pig fat. We were not the best behaved kids - flying paper aeroplanes over the balcony. Saturday morning club recognised birthdays as well - when it was our birthday we were... Read more
The Simla PH, Parchmore Road
My friend Roy Greenfield's parents ran the Simla, which was a Charrington's pub.
Thornton Heath, High Street
My family moved back to Thornton Heath, to 35 Gilsland Road, just off the High Street, at the end of the war and stayed until 1951. United Dairies was the shop on one corner and next to that a sweetshop and tobacconists and then on to the Co-op which extended round the corner of Nursery Road. On the other corner was Pearks from where sadly my little brother had his brand new Gresham Flyer 3-wheeler bike stolen - I remember Festival of Britain memorabilia being displayed in the windows of the Co-op and the last tram going down the High Street. Iles was the shop opposite Gilsland Road where my Nan used to buy lino for her living room. I joined the Brownies in the hall at the side of St. Albans Church and went to Whitehorse Primary School - we would buy a 1d apple from the grocers shop (up 3 steps to the door) on the way to school.
Hansom Carriage
I can still remember the sound of the horse's "clipperty-clopp" as we went home in the hansom carriage after arriving at Thornton Heath station - I must have been about eight years old at the time - I always looked forward to our ride home.
First Love 1961/1964.
The year is 1961, I was invited to a friends wedding at St Johns Church, Penge. On arrival at the church I spotted a beautiful girl dressed in a turquoise two piece outfit trimmed in black (she was as if all your dreams had come true). The evening progressed and I plucked up the courage and asked if I could take her home, well I did take her home and she lived in Bensham Manor Road, Thornton Heath. We made a date to see each other the next week. The next day being Sunday I can't wait for next week to come so I walked four miles to see her. A year or so passed and we got engaged and started to plan the future as all couples do - the only problem was that my parents where having none of this. This is when the pressure and the arguments started at home and they went out of their way to destroy our relationship; they where successful. As the weeks... Read more
Photos of me
When I went to School in Beaulah Road and I do not have any photos. If any one has any photos of me when I was little, email me, I would be very grateful.
Basket Works Etc.circa 1943-1960
Contributor Mr Sosgez remembers basket weaving in Thornton Heath. This was almost certainly Tom Mason Ltd in Norbury Road. It was run by Mr George Newton and occupied premises that had been a United Dairies depot and stables. The shop front was in Norbury Road next to Mr Cowell's newsagents and barbers shop, with the works stretching quite a long way back with a side entrance letting out onto the lower end of Moffat Road. I remember the place very well as my best mate, Mr Newton's son Roy and I would play there, climbing up into the stacked cane high in the roof. The water in those tanks, used for soaking and softening the cane, smelled awful and produced a horrid looking scum. Mr Newton told us (I think with tongue in cheek) that this was similar to recently discovered Penicillin and had healing powers! One worker I remember was a young Polishman called Jan. Mr Newton had many business interests including the wireworks two shops away... Read more
St Andrews Church
I can remember the old St Andrews in Brook Road, which was demolished and the new church built in its place. Wonderful old building, tiny spiral stairs to the balcony level, beautiful. Shame I have no pictures.
Basket Weaving
In the early 60s I went to a works in Thornton Heath where they made willow baskets. There were huge vats of water for soaking large bundles of stripped willow to make them supple prior to being woven into things like shopping trolley baskets, or hand baskets. I don't think there was any mechanisation at all.
I'd be interested to know where this was and who ran it. Possibly a relative of mine?
I have a vague idea it was north of the centre of TH.
First Love Thornton Heath 1963-69
My memories of Thornton Heath are not as a local resident, but as the girlfriend of someone who lived in the area and with whom I went out for 6 years from the age of 15 to 21, eventually becoming engaged when I was 19. His name was Martin Clarke (Mart), and he lived with his parents and brother Stuart in the top flat of the block next to Woolworths, facing the Clock Tower. As teenagers without a great deal of money, most of our time was spent wandering round the shopping centre at Croydon on a Saturday. We would go and have a tea in the Fairfield Halls with our friends or hang around shops looking at things we couldn't afford to buy. As we grew older, we both got Saturday jobs with Lambeth Libraries and had more money to go out. We would go and see films at the big Cinema near Thornton Heath Ponds (was it called the State?), and occasionally go to see plays at the... Read more
Any Memories of Bill Black?
There was music shop on the Thornton Road in the mid 1950s, run by a Ada Lilian Rose who lived there with her three children. It's a bit of a long shot but I'm actually trying to trace someone called William or Bill Black who was a trombone player in The Billy Cotton band, who we think lived in the area and visited the shop around this time. I also know that he worked as a motor mechanic, poissibly locally; was married and had a son of around 8 years old.
If anyone has memories of any of this information, I would be very grateful if you could let me know. Thank you.
Iggy 'Eskimo Girl' From Thornton Heath
Does anybody remember a girl called Iggy nicknamed 'the Eskimo' who lived with her parents in Thornton Heath in the Fifties/ early Sixties? She was born in 1944 or 45 and was, in the mid Sixties, a photo model, actress, dancer and genuine party animal. She is most famous for her short relationship with Pink Floyd founder Syd Barrett but left the underground Swingin’ London scene in 1970. She has never been heard of since.
We try to retrace her steps and would be much obliged if anyone from Thornton Heath remembers her. Movies, picture galleries, press articles and the odd biographical bit can be found by visiting The Holy Church of Iggy the Inuit, a blog dedicated to her.
Memories of Surrey
Creasey's Coachworks at South Norwood
My Grandad, George Creasey Allen, and my Nana Allen married and settled in South Norwood in 1899. They lived at Addison Road before renting a house at 32 Apsley Road. Grandad got a job at Creasey's coachworks straight from school and worked there all his working life. He stayed working there through the First World War even though he might have got more money working with munitions, as he needed to make sure he would have a job to support his family after the war ended. To start with he worked in the woodshed. Ernest Creasey managed the Creasey Wheelwrights business. My Grandad started work for Ernest when he left school at 12 or 13. Ernest Creasey himself didn't start the business as it was previously run by his father and grandfather before him. The business was in Pembury Road. Before the First World War my mother's brothers and sisters would go along to the workshops on a bank holiday and look around and play there. Apparently it was fun... Read more
Wartime Friendship
Hi, My grandfather was friends with a Margaret Lewis who lived at H8 Frant Road, Thornton Heath (Croydon) in 1944. She was single and had two brothers in the service. One was in India and the other in the Middle East. She would be about 86 years old now. During the war she was in the WAAF and was stationed near Leighton Buzzard. If you have any advice to find her, please let me know. As my grandfather has passed away, I would like to talk with her about the war years. Best Regards, Don Morrison Akron, OH, USA
Photo Search
Please HELP we are trying to get hold of a photograph of 25 High Street SE25 6EZ in the 1900s we have tryed everything have you got any ideas.
Upper Norwood
I grew up in Palace Road and I remember going to the Granada Cinema as a child and opposite was a shop that had a train set in the window and if you put an old penny in the slot it would go round. This would have been approx. 1965.
Dulwich Wood Avenue
This is now the Gipsy Hill roundabout at the end of Croxted Road at the junction of Aleyn Road, Gipsy Road and Dulwich Wood Avenue (formerly named The Avenue). This photograph is looking along the length of Dulwich Wood Avenue with Crystal Palace clearly in the background. A magnificent photo and very rare to find a photo of Dulwich Wood Avenue and the former triangular shrubbed triangle which is now an ugly big roundabout! The triangle remained until after the Second World War but as traffic and congestion increased dramatically with more cars on the road the triangle was replaced in around 1960.
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